Arriving in Balloon-town

Old Santa Fe Plaza

Spent the better part of yesterday in Santa Fe.  The Old Town area is charming with lots of shops bulging full of inventory.  A couple shops have gone under, while others are hanging on by the fingernails hoping for a good holiday season.

Old Santa Fe Street Scene

We didn’t contribute $$$ to the salvation of the place, but did enjoy a nice lunch at Tia Sophia’s that left us waddling after we finished. Visited the Georgia O’Keeffe art museum.  She spent most of her productive years in this area. Unfortunately, the video projector broke just before we arrived, so we missed the full biography. They ‘rain-checked’ us for the next time in Santa Fe, which could be the twelfth of never, to use a Johnny ‘Mattress’ term.  And that description of Johnny Mathis was passed on to me by my ‘best man’ and former law school roommate, now a Superior Court Judge. He claimed that  Johnny Mathis’ tunes had a special effect, and I don’t think he was talking about narcolepsy. I digress.

Old Santa Fe  

Was tempted again to buy a hat, but the one that was going for $32 the other day at the Indian flea market was being sold in Old Santa Fe for $47.50.  Apologies to the Indian flea market.

"Chief, I'm ready to bury the hatchet over this 'hat' thing."

Storm clouds gathered during the day and rain began to spatter as we left the NM State Capitol building.  Nice art exhibit there.  Apparently their legislators were not in session, as security was lax, with the security personnel in crossword puzzle mode.   No metal detectors, but then it is likely that most of the looneys have left NM for California.

"Jeff, why do you make me do these pictures?"

 Leaving town, we stopped at Trader Joes to replenish dwindling provisions, noting that NM is a ‘three-buck Chuck’ state. Such is the price to pay for fine imported wine from the golden state.

Today found us headed down Hwy 25, cruising downhill at 70-75 to Albuquerque where we landed at the American RV Park on I-40.  Very nice park except for the rumble of semis flying by on the highway.  The park is packed (222 sites) in anticipation of the Balloon Fiesta, our home-to-be starting Friday.

We checked out the Fiesta grounds on an afternoon recon mission.  Met Betty, a RV full-timer and balloon fan who encouraged us to sign up to crew for a balloon.  Sounds like fun, even for geezers.. Crewing means unpacking the balloon and basket, assisting its inflation and then chasing it when it goes up, and then re-packing it when it comes down.

In the “I can’t believe I did that” category:  When we arrived today, the park advised that the water would be off for about a half-hour while they made some repairs. We set up and then commenced a few hours of housework.  At one point water began flowing off the roof and down the awning.  A steady stream.  I clambered up on the roof and noted that water was gushing out the toilet vent pipe. (Fortunately the water was ‘clear’ as I had dumped the tank this morning.)  The culprit was the toilet tank back-flush line.  When I hooked up, I apparently had accidentally hit the valve and knocked it to an ‘open’ position.  Normally with the park’s water on, I would have noticed this immediately.

  

Instead it filled the ‘black’ tank with forty gallons of water and then headed up the vent pipe. We were fortunate that we had stayed ‘home’ cleaning rather than going out right away.  We were more fortunate that neither one of us used the toilet while the water was going up and out the vent pipe. A ‘flush’ would have opened the potty valve and ’Old Faithful’ would have gushed upwards. It would have been like a fire hose bidet. The perils of the road.